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EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. -- Desperation oozed from every pore. If New York-area basketball hasn't reached its nadir, it's only because the NBA has a silly rule that some team must win. Otherwise, who knows how low this charade might go? The players might be the ones slipping paper bags over their heads, to match the fans' embarrassment as they sit in the stands and try not to rubberneck. Though plenty of empty seats were available, more than the usual few gluttons for punishment showed up at the Izod Center Saturday afternoon, hoping to see ... what? New Jersey Nets coach Lawrence Frank fired after the first quarter? New York Knicks owner James Dolan do an about-face and sign Allen Iverson to a multi-year deal? The teams set a combined record for most horrendous shooting in four quarters? Dora the Explorer, the day's big draw, dunk over Nate Robinson? The possibilities really were endless.
As it was, the Nets dropped to 0-13 and continued to careen dangerously toward matching the league record of 17 straight losses to open a season. The Knicks, by virtue of their 98-91 victory, actually won consecutive games to improve to 3-9, and can now turn their focus back on the real goal: convincing LeBron James, or any big free agent to-be, that the cesspool really isn't as nasty as it currently looks.
But it sure can be comical. The first quarter was ripe with airballs and missed connections, but mostly it will be remembered for lovable Nate taking an inbounds pass with half a second left on the clock, and shooting at the wrong basket. The ball swished through the hoop just a whisper after the buzzer sounded, more terrible luck for the Nets, who could use three points no matter how they come. Knicks coach Mike D'Antoni looked as if he wanted to pull a Latrell Sprewell on Robinson right then and there.
"Don't mess with the game," D'Antoni told Robinson during the heated pause between quarters. Robinson apologized but played only six minutes total, none in the second half.
"It wasn't like I was trying to make it, like seriously. It was just a shot. I waited until the buzzer went off," said Robinson, who doesn't seem to realize this is the worst possible time for the Knicks to indulge such foolishness. Hey, at least he hit one basket for the day.
As an Elmo balloon hovered above the action -- it was, after all, cartoon day in the Meadowlands -- decent basketball actually crept onto the court for a brief sliver of play. Down by 15 points in the third quarter and seven to start the fourth, the Nets pulled to within two on Chris Douglas-Roberts' jumper with 1:57 remaining. He was thick in the middle of the Nets' comeback on both ends of the court, but the Nets, cursed by a short bench and a long history of falling short, couldn't leap over the hump.
"This many losses without a win, I really don't know what to feel. I don't really know where I'm at right now," Douglas-Roberts said. "Mentally, it's tough."
Fittingly, it was New Jersey native Al Harrington who stuck the dagger between the Nets' shoulder blades. Grabbing a pass off David Lee on the pick-and-roll, Harrington nailed a 3-pointer that made it 94-87 Knicks with 59 seconds left. His blue mouth guard popping out like a piece of gum, Harrington flapped his arms in happy celebration. Traded to the Knicks one year ago exactly from the Golden State Warriors, Harrington is still under the illusion New York might actually turn into a decent team.
"Two in a row baby, we're on a winning streak," he half-joked, after matching teammate Danilo Gallinari with 17 points. "We needed this win more than we probably want to admit. We didn't want to be that team."
Who knows when the Nets will experience the elation that rides shotgun with a "W"? They aren't so much awful as they are undermanned and very, very lost. They managed to connect on only 4 of 18 from 3-point range, barely broke 90 points against one of the league's worst teams and often played defense as if they were trying to stop the ocean's waves. Anything can happen in the NBA -- the Knicks, for example, can pass on drafting Brandon Jennings, the kid who the other night dropped a double nickel -- 55 points -- in just his seventh game in the league -- so maybe the Nets won't match the ignominious record of 17 straight losses, a mark currently shared by both the 1988-89 Miami Heat and the 1998-99 Los Angeles Clippers. Maybe the Nets will eek out a win during the difficult four-game road trip out West that looms this week, starting with back-to-back games at Denver and Portland and topped by a meeting with the L.A. Lakers. Maybe Julius Erving will come out of retirement and demand all balls be replaced with tri-colored red, white and blue orbs, just to flip the team's karma.
"I'll take 100 percent responsibility for where we're at because these guys have worked their tails off," said Frank, who before the game had joked that a guillotine might be ready for sharpening, considering the large media presence on hand to watch two wretched teams. "If we continue to have these habits and we don't allow frustration to lead to a lack of confidence and a lack of faith, I think we will break through."
The Nets have spent the early season down more players than any other team, but Saturday Devin Harris, out 10 games with a strained groin, returned to the lineup and looked sharp in stretches. He wasn't made for wearing fancy suits and sitting on the sidelines, he said, before scoring 12 points and handing out seven assists in 26 stuttered minutes off the bench.
"It would take a toll on anybody," Harris said of the Nets' record. "Obviously nobody wants to start 0-and-whatever it is. What hurts more is so many close games we're losing. If we were getting blown out every game, I think everybody would be like, 'OK, we need to change something up.' But we're right there each and every game. We've just got to find a way to overcome the last six minutes."
These past few weeks have provided an interesting prism into how the locals handle losing. Flush from the New York Yankees winning the World Series, New Yorkers and their brethren across the river aren't used to such an unsightly collision of ineptness. The Nets can mostly be forgiven, given the injuries and that they are, well, the Nets. But when the Knicks can barely go through the motions, as if the players are taking cues from a front office concentrating on the LeBron sweepstakes, the former Mecca of basketball reaches high alert.
Iverson certainly would have infused the Garden with brief flashes of excitement. But what would happen if and when he pouted about coming off the bench, or went into an honest rant about the feral climate that trails the Knicks? That's hardly an effective way to recruit LeBron, which is exactly why Dolan vetoed D'Antoni and president Donnie Walsh in their bid to bring aboard Iverson, the wayward free agent. He was the short, wrong answer to a complicated problem.
"I'm kind of at a loss for words to describe what we're seeing," Walt Frazier, the former Knick, current broadcaster and longtime connoisseur of New York basketball, was saying Saturday. And there you have it: the loquacious Clyde, gone mum and numb. Such is the tormented state in which NY and NJ basketball fans now live.
